World's No. 1 University is Right Here in L.A.

When we think of great college towns, Boston, New York and Philadelphia come to mind. But Los Angeles, barely even on the map when those cities' schools were turning out world leaders, might just be king.

Thirteen performance indicators representing research (worth 30 percent of a school's overall ranking score), teaching (30 percent), citations (30 percent), international outlook (which includes the total numbers of international students and faculty and the ratio of scholarly papers with international collaborators, 7.5 percent), and industry income (a measure of innovation, 2.5 percent) make up the data. The data were collected, analyzed, and verified by Thomson Reuters.

Times Higher Education

UCLA noted in a statement, meanwhile, that it climbed one spot compared to last year's number 13 spot. And it's the second-ranked public university on the list next to sibling UC Berkeley, which came in at number 8.